Kids Day at Kiboko Bay

Too Little Children has officially pulled off its first field trip, and it was a raging success, if I may say so. On Sunday we took the kiddos to Kiboko Bay Resort, where they got to go swimming for the first time. It was quite a sight to see. Since we only have bucket showers at the house, they've never been fully submerged in water-EVER. And I just couldn't have that. I was very happy to have Liz and Karen, (two of my visiting volunteer nurse friends) here to help herd the children, who wander like cats.

(Me and Zed getting used to the water)

It was really fun to watch the kids in the water. Most of them got in the water right away, but they didn't seem to know what to do once they got there. It wasn't until some other kids got there and gave a demonstration of splashing and jumping and general horseplay, did they seem to get it. Vinicent was the most taken with the water, and spent his time perfecting the belly flop. Precious, Anne's daughter, was the one who surprised me. She absolutely loved wearing her "swimming costume" but screamed like she was being boiled alive whenever we tried to get her near the water. She ended up dancing around the pools edge, and splashing in the little outdoor shower all day instead. Whatever makes you happy, I guess ;)

(Karen teaching Eddah how to take her feet off the bottom of the pool)

(Vinicent, Daniel, Aronold and Naomy liked racing, even though Naomy always cheated with a head start :)

When teeth started chattering we took a break from the pool and went out on a boat ride. We went out in search of hippos, which live in Lake Victoria, but it was the middle of the day, so they were all sleeping. We may have seen one asleep, but we also may have watched a rock for 15 minutes.....hard to tell. It was also all their first time on a boat, so that was entertaining. We got to see the fisherman mending their nets on the shores, since a lot of fishing is done here at night.

(Vinicent couldn't keep his hands out of the water, especially when he realized he could spray the people behind him ;)

(Fishing boat)

(Tired happy kids at the end of the day. Watching the comings and goings on the water. Naomy fell asleep shortly after this pic :)

 

Great day,

Jessie

 

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Teen Talk and Tooth Extractions

I am happy to report Zedekia is doing so much better. The first few days yanked my heart strings so, I was seriously questioning my decision to take him, but he is now thriving. He especially loves Precious, Anne's daughter, and they have become jointed at the hip. He is consistently smiling now, which is a significant improvement. He is able to tolerate 3 meals a day now (he was used to one), and his potty training is much better. His new ability to smile has revealed some atrocious looking teeth, so I'm trying to track down a dentist ASAP. We've already removed the two worst teeth manually, but I think the others will require a little more invasive means. Poor babe. Here's hoping the rotten ones are all baby teeth and his permanent teeth are still intact and salvageable. He can make sounds though, and even whispers some words. I realized yesterday the word he whispers when he sits in my lap is "jes-cah". Love. That. Boy.

(Zed and Precious)

(Zed and Virginia doing a little light reading ;)

Zedekia is especially taken with books and loves to point out ever car in the books he flips through. Don't bother trying to teach him with about anything else on the page, he is only interested in the cars. If you get distracted by the colorful pictures of animals, food, etc, he will take your finger and bring you back to the cars, which is the only reason we started reading this book in the first place, silly mzungu :)

(Giving the pad talk at Emmatsi Secondary School)

Virginia and I have also been busy with the pad project. We've visited several different schools to distribute the pads, and we've also been promoting the project by traveling to new schools to talk with teachers and principals and tell them about the program. We enrolled two new schools yesterday. Virgnia jumped right in and was unphased by the tangible awkwardness that permeates a room whenever you approach the toics of menstration and sex with a room full of teenage girls. When we talked with the secondary school girls (high school), we were peppered with questions at the end for over an hour. Just shows how much they need the education, as well as the pads. A good portion of their questions revolved around virginity and what qualifies you as a virgin-since these were older girls, I assume it was especially pertinent because it pertained to their dowries. Not quite the same type of questions we get in the US............

(Girls at Emmatsi Secondary School )

We have another pad talk tomorrow, and our big field trip to the swimming pool this weekend, so stay tuned ;)

Jessie

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Palliative Care and Window Panes

My travel adventure for the week consisted of a trip to El Doret, a city 3 hours from here. My friend Adam has been working there for the month, and I went to see what another hospital with an international influence is like. My day started as the sun was coming up and I hopped a matatu to Luanda to catch a bus. I had to find the bus that was going to Nairobi, but was going the Kapsabet route, and not the Nakuru route. Needless to say, with the language barrier and the inconsistency of Kenya, I was only about 75% sure that I boarded the right bus. But what is an adventure without a little anxiety, right? Thankfully it was the right bus, and to add to my delight, they played Gangsters Paradise and Mariah Carey, You'll Always Be My Baby on a loop, so I was never without nostalgic entertainment.

(Me and Adam doing a little exploring in Kisumu)

Adam is working at Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital this month, which is a huge, public hospital, and I got to go on rounds with him while I was there. It was more common than not to see 2 patients to a single bed........pretty much ever infectious disease doctor's worst nightmare. He was working as part of their palliative care team, which is bigger and better supported than the palliative care team at Duke. I'm not sure if that means Moi is just that good, or Duke is just that bad.......anyway, never have I seen such a place that warrants a good palliative care team. There is some pretty intense suffering in this world, and no matter how long you do this it is never easy to see. I have never been so thankful for a team of people devoted to easing the suffering of others.
On a happier note, I am delighted with the newest member to our small but scrappy team of Too Little Children staff. Her name is Anne, and she will be joining Jacky as a house mom. She will be spending the days with the kids while Jacky is working at the Rotary House. Jacky will still be with the kids at night, but her work load was getting to be too much with working at both houses. Ann is a great addition to our team, and we now have staff that speaks both Luo and Luhya-the two tribal languages surrounding us. Her daughter, Precious-and she is quite literally-comes with her as well, and has become besties with Zedekia. Adorable. They like to hold hands ;) I have made it my mission to catch it on camera, but so far they have outsmarted me.
My summer and fall intern, Virginia, who is a Duke undergrad student, is also here now, and has jumped right into orphanage work and the pad project. Per the usual, I have a lot of maintenance/upkeep chores to do on the two houses, which has kept me pretty busy. And per the usual, I was quoted mzungu price for a lot of the repairs. I bargained most of them down, but there are some things I refuse to pay more for-strictly on principle.......so Virginia and I ended up fixing the 3 broken window panes at the kid's house. We are becoming quite the handy women ;)

(Virginia quickly mastered the art of window paning)

(The neighbors came out and offered me a job doing their windows when they saw me perched on the side of the house like this :)

(Tying mattresses to the roof of the ambulance during our much needed supplies run to Kisumu)

Virginia and I start our pad distribution in the next few days, so I'll keep you posted on our progress!
Jessie

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Stars and Swahili

After 24+ hours of relatively uneventful travel, I have arrived at home in Maseno. This was my first time flying through Dubai, but I didn't have time to actually go out in the city. It does have quite a fancy airport, of which the highlight-and slightly alarming surprise-was the heated toilet seats :). And of course I had to buy a little something so I could get change, as i am a lover of foreign coins. Since I had no major travel adventures or mishaps to regale you all with this time, I will jump right into news from Maseno.

(The kids working on homework)

The kiddos are doing well. Brian, who used to be baby-faced and delightfully pudgy, is now as tall as Daniel. Dimples are still intact though ;). They are all "big and fat" which is how we describe healthy children here (and adults too, much to the horror of American visitors:). We spent the evening after i arrived putting up glow in the dark stars all over the house, compliments of my wonderful and thoughtful mom, known here as "Mama Jescah" (meaning mama OF Jescah :). I don't think they really understood the whole glow in the dark thing, but they took their job of star placement very seriously. I was the distributor of the disproportionately tiny wad of stickum they give you, so it didn't all end up in Arnold's hair. There was a bit of squabbling when Naomy did not agree with the cluster formations that Daniel was making and could not convince him that they needed to be equally spaced over the wall, but overall it was a peaceful and fun affair. When we turned off the lights I heard a chourus of, "Ooooooohhhh". Nothing is more precious than the awe of children. Then Vinicent said, "It's just like heaven." I know, right.............

(Naomy and Arnold deep in discussion on star placement)

Zedekia arrived this morning with his grandmother. I've known him for the last several years, and knew his mother before she died in 2010. He's been with his grandmother ever since, but she has recently become to ill to care for him. He had some pretty severe nutritional and stimulation deficits during his first few yrs, and really doesn't speak yet, even though he's about 6 yrs old. He really hasn't been around other kids much, and has not started school yet. I had wanted to get him into school as quickly as possible to see if we can start to bridge the gap, but then we ran into a little glitch........Zed doesn't speak/understand swahili or English. Both languages are taught in school, and since he hasn't been, he only understands Luo, his tribal language. I also hired another part-time "house mom" to help Jacky and give Zed more individualized attention, and guess what she speaks?? Not Luo. But Jacky does, so we aren't totally up the creek. He is a smart kid and seems to be a fast learner, so I think he'll pick up Swahili quickly.

This is our little family, before the addition of Zedekia, whom will be photographed when he no longer appears afraid of my camera :).

In other news, I've been rounding in the hospital every morning with Gina, who is our chief resident from the University of Tennessee, who will be here until June. We also had Eric and Laura, another doctor and his wife, join us yesterday. They will be here for a month. The big news with their arrival is they brought their 2 yr old, Isabelle. Now we dont see a lot of mzungu babies here, so she has caused quite the stir. I took them on a little walking tour of the village yesterday, and a woman literally yelled out the window of a shop, "Please, can I touch your baby?!" Thankfully, Eric and Laura are pretty laid back, and allowed a gaggle of women to surround them and pat her blonde wisy hair and discuss the oddity of her big blue eyes. She's a doll, and has already made friends with Braven, our 2 yr old neighbor boy who can get into our house with the ease of a cat burglar, and likes climb on the bunk beds.

Stay tuned, more news and pics to come soon!

Jessie

 

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Rabbits and Re-purposed sheets

How time flies………let me tell you what we've been up to.

First, Vinicent and I finished the rabbit pen.  I had a rough idea in my head of how the pen would work, but did not feel the need to draw it out, make dimensions, or otherwise plan it very well.  As my mom can attest to in regards to the majority of my projects (especially those involving sewing) that doesn't typically work well for me.  So imagine my delight and surprise when this one did :)  I taught Vinicent how to measure the stakes so they would at least be equi-distant from each other, and Daniel was in charge of cutting the binding wire into equal pieces for attaching the chicken wire to the stakes.   The other children supervised and gave all kinds of helpful chattering advice in swahili.   I left a message for the hospital fundi (carpenter/workman) asking if I could borrow his saw to make the bottom of the stakes into points so they can be driven into the ground.  I had also planned to show Vinicent how to use a saw……….of course, assuming I was more skilled with a saw than he.   When I got home from the wards I found that Vinicent had already done it……and done a better job than I would have.  I guess 12 yr olds are a little more independent and capable here compared to what I'm used to :)  These kids humble me on a daily basis.

The next day we put the girls to work as well adding the finishing touches, which, of course, involved duct tape.   The rabbits seem to be enjoy their new fenced-in freedom, and made short work of the grass.   We now have a fully functioning, and completely portable, rabbit enclosure.  Not too shabby for a mzungu girl and a 12 yr old boy.

(Pictured behind the rabbit fence is the animal house, where the rabbits and chickens go at night).

On another note, I enjoyed a long awaited victory: Back when I was first moving the kids into the children's home, I had a frustrating incident involving sheets.  I bought 8 sets of sheets (pink for the girls, blue for the boys) and was very pleased with myself, both with my matchy-cutesy efforts as well as the good deal I got.  That is-until I got them all washed and on the beds……..it was then I realized there were about 6 inches shorter than the mattresses on both ends.  What?!  

"Oh," Jacky had said, "You got boarding school sheets."  That got a blank stare from me. 

 "You know, they're for students," she said, as if it were an explanation.  Okay……….Why students don't require the full length of bed covering is still a mystery to me, but long story short-I've had a trunk full of worthless sheets for over a year.  Every time I go in the back room to get something off the shelves, I see it there, taunting me.  Reminding me of my cultural ignorance and wasted funds.  Grrr……

So imagine my delight during my annual inventory, when I found we needed new curtains in several rooms and 6 pillowcases needed replacing.  Ah ha!  The sheets will be redeemed.  I asked Jacky to get her sewing machine threaded up, and I showed her my project.   Some of them could be hung lengthwise as double curtains, others cut in half and made into pillowcases.  Well.  That just sent Jacky into a fit of giggles.  When she finally composed herself, she said, "I've never known a mzungu (white person) who made things, instead of just buying them.  You are such a clever girl, Jessie."  Makes me wonder about the other Americans she has encountered in her lifetime………...

I don't know if hanging a curtain-sized piece of fabric in a window and calling it a curtain is necessarily "clever", but when the expectations have been set low,  it's easy to impress :)  

We now have new curtains and pillowcases in the rotary house and the children's home-and more importantly-my useless sheets have been redeemed :)  

Thank you Lord, for the small things.  

Jessie :) 

Stargazing and School Visits

I feel like my time here is going by so fast. 4 weeks is simply not enough time to get all the work done and do all the exploring/adventuring I need/want to do. Alas......I shall do what I can. So the girls and I have been working hard and playing hard. We took a short impromptu overnight trip to the Kakamega rainforest. Poor Jess had a delayed flight, so she arrived about 18 hours before the trip. Not much time for jetlag recovery, but she has proven to be a trooper :). Two of our coworkers and new friends, Ben and Sam, also joined us.

Somehow I talked them into waking up at 4:30 in the morning and I led them on a little sunrise hike to a lovely spot above the tree line where you can see the whole forest. This group was apparently in better shape than my previous groups, and we made it up to the top well before the sunrise, and got to watch the stars for a while. Thankfully we had ample snacks to hold us over :)

Waiting for the sunrise.......

A few days later I took them on another gorgeous and grueling hike to the top of the mountain behind my house, to Emmatsi Primary School. We gave an off-the-cuff address to the entire school of +400 kids, since they were all waiting for us, and our presumed words of wisdom :). After that we pulled all the class 7 and 8 girls out and taught them all about (giggle, giggle) pads, periods, and things of that nature. The female teachers were also there and also received pads. They will be available to the girls to answer questions and talk more if they have questions in the future. (Take a look at toolittlechildren.org to learn more about our cloth, reusable maxi-pad project).

The girls were particularly fond of the pads with the frog print backing-Nice work Rio Verde ladies!

We met with the male teachers before our talk with the girls, and we pleasantly surprised at their ability to talk about menstration and their desire to help their female students. What gems. I didn't know they also had a secondary school (high school), so I will be returning to the mountaintop on my next trip to distribute more ;)

My doctors thoroughly enjoyed the 45 min hike up winding, unmarked mountain paths between log cabin-sized boulders to get up to the school. For some reason, these narrow, unnamed trails are forever etched in my memory, while I often need google maps to get around Durham, despite the fact I've lived there over 6 years. Funny how the mind works sometimes......
Xoxo,
Jessie

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The Battle of the Bank

Life has been clipping along here at a steady pace and I realized I haven't updated my avid readers in awhile (that's you Mom;). It has been a 3 week struggle to get my online banking password. I opened an account here last year to reduce the cost of transferring the monthly budget, and realized when I got home I needed an online PIN. Well, contrary to its name, it cannot be emailed-at least not until you've filled out the paper request form. So I patiently waited 7 months while western union continued to make a king's ransom off my transfer fees. So I filled out the form and was told I would recieve it within 24 hours. I did not. Went back to the bank. Filled out the CORRECT form. Still did not recieve. Went back to the bank to ask more questions. Waited. Didn't recieve. Went back again. Didn't recieve. Went to Kisumu branch(farther away and bigger) and found out my branch isn't authorized to issue codes. Started over. Spent 3 quality hours with branch manager and customer service. Was told I would get an email in 24 hours. No such email. Returned to Kisumu. Repeat last 3 sentences. Then.........hallelujah-I got it! After the jubilant moment of signing in......I found out they require you-after securely signing in-to request another code that's texted to your phone to verify its you. Your Kenyan phone. AKA-not accessible from US. I spent a defeated moment with my face down on the table. As I lay there-cheek to placemat-I decided it was time for a short break from this. This epic battle of Bank vs. Jescah will recommence Monday morning.........stay tuned.
Last weekend I got to have a lovely Sunday afternoon off and spent it at the house of my dear friend, Lynet. After the hike to get there, I was honored to find a kuku (chicken) feast laid out. We had a shady outdoor picnic that ended with a delightful food coma and some quality sun-basking.

Vinicent and I are busy constructing a portable rabbit shelter so his bunnies don't have to stay cooped up in their dark little house all day. We trekked the 20 min to the hardware duka and selected our wood pieces, chicken wire, nails and binding wire. We will also be repurposing an old mosquito net. The shopkeeper was skeptical of our plans, but it all makes sense in my head, so what could go wrong, right? I'll let you know how it turns out.

In other news, my doctors have all arrived. Dr. Hardison and his wife. Jess (from Duke) and Sarah and Suzanne (U of Tenn). We are having all sorts of fun.

Suzanne meets the rabbits.

Vinicent, Daniel, and Sarah doing a little evening studying. We'll be honest-the adults have been reading the children's books as much as we've been reading Harrison's Internal Medicine. I've learned all out pre and post-sinusoidal blood flow thought the liver AND how the Rift Valley was formed (thanks National Geographic for kids;).
Now that Jess has carried over the other half of my supply of cloth maxi-pads we are getting ready to distribute them to schools. I met with a new school last week, Ebulako Primary, and they are very excited to get involved in the Pad Project. I have also been busy arranging for the group of nursing students, who are coming in March, to bring pads and teaching to several new schools-as the lovely ladies back home are producing pads faster than I can bring them over. YAY! It's a problem I am happy to deal with ;) Keep up the good work!
Love love,
Jessie

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